EU Wants To Further Cooperate With Malaysia In Higher Education Sector

KUALA LUMPUR, Jan 14 (Bernama) -- The European Union (EU) wants to further cooperate with Malaysia in the higher education sector, said its Ambassador and Head of Delegation to Malaysia Vincent Piket. Commending Malaysia for having a fast growing and a "very open" higher education sector, he said the number of European universities opening up in this country is increasing. "This reflects the accessibility of Malaysia's higher education, and in fact, a very positive promotion and investment climate," he said when delivering a talk on "Whither Malaysia-EU Relations: A Perspective" organised by the National Press Club (NPC) here, Friday night. Also present was NPC President Mokhtar Hussain. Piket said in order to attract more cooperation from local partners, the union would be presenting its universities at the EU Pavilion in the FACON Education Fair to be held on March 17-18 at the Kuala Lumpur Convention Centre. Apart from the education sector, Piket said the EU also look at Malaysia in three major dimensions - politically, economically and partnership in global and regional issues. "Within the region, Malaysia, without a doubt, is institutionally stable. Malaysia is also very well in increasing capital, a highly developing upper middle income economy. "We are interested in the Economic Transformation Programme (ETP). There are about 2,000 European firms based in Malaysia and their feedback on the ETP has been positive," he said. Commenting on the International Conference of Global Movement of Moderates (GMM) 2012 to be held here from Jan 17 - 19, Piket said the value of the conference would be on defining the consensus of various countries about how to give voice to moderation in dealing with extremism. The European Union comprises 27 countries -- Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, and the United Kingdom. -- BERNAMA malaysia eu